September 28, 2007 12:30 pm : Comments 000
Here’s a wrap-up of what other industry-watchers and media folks have been writing about this week:
Johnson & Johnson’s corporate communications team makes effective use of the corporate blog JNJ BTW (”J&J By the Way”) to, among other things, add context and clarity to breaking news and ongoing issues impacting the company. Media relations team member Bill Price talks about his first few months on the job and touches on the challenge of shaking the diverse organization’s public image as “the baby company.”
Public Relations professor Dr. Donald Wright at Boston University’s College of Communication talks to Strumpette about shortcomings in campus PR curriculums.
Shel Holtz adds his two cents on where Microsoft and its public relations agency made a big blunder with the creation and marketing of an advocacy group.
Jay Hancock’s blog at The Baltimore Sun reports that a paper co-authored by professors from Penn State, Georgia State University, and Arizona State University found that negative media coverage of poorly run companies actually does spur positive organizational changes.
The blog Catching Flack says that, while numerous companies have jumped on the blogging bandwagon, a blog might not be the right move for every company.
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September 27, 2007 12:22 pm : Comments 000
Our office was deeply saddened this week to learn about the death of Darryll Walter Bolduc, a former client and someone whose fearless efforts to take on powerful interests we truly admired.
Our relationship with Darryll began nearly four years ago when he was a newly minted attorney about to hang out his first shingle in Charlotte, NC. The law practice was a second career for him; as Darryll openly discussed, he decided to go to law school only after being blackballed from the securities industry for being a whistleblower.
A former bond trader with NationsBank, a predecessor to Bank of America, Darryll in 1995 filed a wrongful-termination suit against NationsBank claiming he was fired after warning company executives about accounting irregularities devised to hide trading losses. NationsBank initially claimed the standard he-wasn’t-a-team-player disparagement and blamed his “overly aggressive trading style,” but soon after The Wall Street Journal got wind of his lawsuit the company settled with him for more than $500,000.
Fighting his wrongful termination taught Darryll a painful lesson about the perils of taking on North Carolina’s Establishment. Virtually all of the employment attorneys he approached shunned his case as they were on retainer or had business dealings with either NationsBank or one of the other major financial services companies in the area. As Fortune Small Business wrote, Charlotte is “a town where connections between banks and lawyers run deep.” Although he garnered a lucrative settlement, he was unable to land a comparable bond trading job like the one he had had at NationsBank. He had been labeled a troublemaker.
Recognizing there was a void of top-flight employment attorneys willing to take on the small but extremely powerful coterie of Charlotte-area companies, Darryll attended law school and set up shop as a securities arbitration and employment law attorney. It didn’t take him long before he made his presence known: Within two years he was working on cases against many of the big corporate names in Charlotte, including Bank of America, Wachovia, TIAA-CREF, Philip Morris, and NASCAR. By design, many of his cases involved whistleblowers.
Darryll couldn’t afford to retain a New York City PR firm for an extended period, but we kept in touch with him over the years and helped him out whenever we could. Many of his clients were individuals from low or middle rungs of corporate ladders who had been made scapegoats for others’ blunders and transgressions, or like Darryll, had dared to sound warning alarms about perceived wrongdoing by their bosses.
Darryll never let the emotional aspects of his cases cloud his legal judgment and, despite representing the corporate downtrodden, he never held himself out to be a crusader. Indeed, he was soft spoken, genteel, and extremely gracious. Those who know him on a more personal level have since talked about his kindness, his sense of humor, his optimism and his hands that seemed forever extended to someone in need. We regret that we never had an opportunity to meet Darryll in person. His kind doesn’t come around often.
Darryll called us a few weeks ago to let us know the Charlotte Observer was planning a feature on him and that we might be getting a call from a reporter. Tragically, the story they ran was his obituary.
Darryll Walter Bolduc was only 47 when he died. Our most heartfelt sympathies go out to his family, friends, colleagues, and clients.
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September 25, 2007 1:54 pm : Comments 004
Other media-related posts in this series:
The New York Times vs. Eli Lilly
One of my favorite Saturday morning rituals is to pass the early hours with a steaming cup of overpriced coffee and an ambitious pile of newspapers. Call me old school, but I prefer paper to pixels, relying on printed news sources over the online variety to keep me informed of the Big Picture stuff. As a former journalist, newspaper ink still runs through my veins.
The never-quite-dormant reporter in me was jarred awake two weekends ago as I sat in my local java joint, reading The New York Times‘ business section. Buried on page two was a brief item about Dr. David Egilman, an “expert witness” hired by the plaintiffs in a legal dispute with Eli Lilly regarding its antipsychotic drug Zyprexa, who was now ‘fessing up that he had indeed given selected confidential documents, as alleged, to an Alaska attorney, who in turn gave the documents to Times reporter Alex Berenson. The story reported that Dr. Egilman had agreed to pay $100,000 to Eli Lilly to settle the case, and that he had acknowledged in a court filing that “there was another side to the Zyprexa story” that wasn’t represented in the documents that had been given to the Times.
The story piqued my curiosity. I recalled the Times had previously run a series of damning page-one articles by Mr. Berenson reporting that Eli Lilly had failed to inform doctors that Zyprexa could cause excessive weight gain and diabetes, a not-so-insignificant unwanted side effect that sparked thousands of class action lawsuits. If an expert witness involved in those cases was now publicly admitting that “there was another side of the story,” the disclosure certainly deserved considerably more prominence than a brief mention, particularly as Zyprexa accounts for nearly one-third of Eli Lilly’s profits.
There were other signs that something was radically amiss. There was neither byline nor attribution to a wire service, and the article made no mention of any attempts to contact Dr. Egilman or Eli Lilly for comment, all of which are otherwise standard for the Times. And most curious of all, the story quoted Times attorney George Freeman defending Mr. Berenson’s articles as being “newsworthy and accurate.” Hmmm… like most top-tier publications, the Times would typically offer up its editors to defend the newspaper’s editorial judgments when questioned. Was there some behind-the-curtain legal impetus driving Mr. Freeman’s involvement in this piece? I grew increasingly intrigued and started digging into the story myself.
Turns out my hunch proved correct. A respected federal judge in February accused Mr. Berenson of being “deeply involved” with Dr. Egilman (and the attorney to whom the latter had turned over the confidential documents) in an “illegal” scheme that effectively amounted to “stealing” the documents. In an impassioned decision [PDF] simmering with outrage, senior federal district Judge Jack B. Weinstein also warned that the documents obtained by Mr. Berenson “are segments of a large body of information, whose selective and out-of-context disclosure may lead to confusion in the patient community and undeserved reputational harm” to the drugmaker. Judge Weinstein went so far as to declare Mr. Berenson’s conduct “reprehensible.”
While the Times did carry a concise report on Judge Weinstein’s decision (albeit on page C7 unlike Mr. Berenson’s extensive page-one pieces), it was Mr. Freeman who officially commented, stating that the decision “vastly overstates Alex’s role in the release of the documents” (thereby suggesting that he did indeed participate in some capacity). Company spokeswoman Diane McNulty echoed the statement almost verbatim to other news outlets. The Times has yet to offer its version of the actual extent of Mr. Berenson’s involvement.
Exactly how Alex Berenson obtained and reported on the Zyprexa documents should be of critical concern to all corporations and anyone concerned with privacy rights and the integrity of the judicial system. The documents in question were among reams-worth of evidence furnished by the pharmaceutical company to expedite the settlement of some 30,000 personal injury suits relating to its drug. According to Judge Weinstein [PDF], they included “a substantial amount” of sensitive information, including individual patient medical records and proprietary trade secrets. Among other reasons, they were sealed by the court to protect litigants “from the embarrassment and oppression that would result from the unnecessary pretrial disclosure of their private information.”
First Amendment champions will no doubt continue to defend Mr. Berenson’s alleged zealousness and say the public’s right to know was well served by his reporting, even if it was based on an incomplete set of documents. Predictably, even the Times itself went down that road, albeit in a roundabout fashion. Others will speculate that the information disclosed by Mr. Berenson likely was responsible for Eli Lilly agreeing to settle the scores of Zyprexa lawsuits for more than $1 billion and that his means were justified by the end.
But it’s difficult to argue that Mr. Berenson was solely driven by the pursuit of a noble cause. After all, according to testimony by James Gottstein, the Alaska attorney who gave the Times the documents, Mr. Berenson insisted he wouldn’t publish the story [PDF] if Mr. Gottstein followed through with his original plan to disseminate them widely to other news organizations. Apparently what’s good for the Times carries a teensy more weight than what’s good for the public.
So Who is This Dr. David Egilman?
Dr. David Egilman, a Massachusetts doctor and a clinical associate professor of community health at Brown University, is a physician on a mission. Citing the influence of his father, who was interred in a German concentration camp, and the 18th century philosopher Edmund Burke, Dr. Egilman says he has “devoted” considerable time and resources studying and reporting on the effects of silence on public health. “Silence can injure and kill,” he recently posted on a website. “For public health, the sound of silence is the funeral dirge. I have not and will never play that tune.”
Dr. Egilman’s vocal orchestrations have afforded him a lucrative sideline. According to one report, he has earned millions – as much as $25 million – testifying as an expert witness at about 100 personal injury trials; another report pegs the number at about $2.5 million. His exact expertise is difficult to discern: he has been identified in one news account as “an expert on occupational lung disease,” but he has testified on subjects requiring a much wider range of medical knowledge including cardiology, obesity, and diabetes. Indeed, just a few years ago, he was involved as an expert witness in a case filed against Merck by a widow claiming her husband died of a Vioxx-related heart attack. A Merck attorney characterized Dr. Egilman as someone who “is prepared to testify to just about anything,” noting that his expert designation had been filed with the court prior to him reviewing any documents relating to the case.
Dr. Egilman is no stranger to controversy. In February 2005, he repackaged a proposed bylined article for the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine as a paid advertisement after it was rejected by the editorial board, thereby bypassing the peer review process. Later that year, jurors in a landmark Colorado toxics trial were instructed to ignore Dr. Egilman’s testimony after the judge learned that he had violated a gag order and posted “scurrilous and inflammatory” information about the trial on his website. The judge ruled that Dr. Egilman was “not objective, reliable, or credible.” The doctor subsequently sued two prominent law firms for allegedly gaining improper access to his password-protected website, which was how the court had learned of his postings. After a judge ruled against him, Dr. Egilman declared: “The legal system is designed to benefit people in power. That is why courts said it was legal for blacks to be slaves or ruled it legal to deny women the vote.”
Dr. Egilman’s relationship with The New York Times dates back to at least the early nineties. After being rebuffed by 60 Minutes and other news organizations, he claims to have been responsible for a page-one story the Times ran that year about the Atomic Energy Commission being warned that it could ultimately face criticism for using human subjects to conduct radiation experiments. Dr. Egilman’s hometown newspaper wrote a story about his advocacy work, noting his media placement efforts among others (the feature presumably placed with the continued help of his publicist).
Mr. Berenson has quoted Dr. Egilman multiple times, including a 2003 story about how trial lawyers planned an onslaught of lawsuits against drug manufacturers for failing to disclose the “hidden” dangers of their medicines.
Judge Weinstein’s Perspective
Based on various testimonies, Judge Weinstein concluded that Dr. Egilman tipped off Mr. Berenson that there were some damaging documents about Zyprexa under court-ordered seal, and that the latter inappropriately acted to obtain those documents. These excerpts from his 78-page opinion [PDF] speak for themselves:
“…Alex Berenson was aware of the protective order. He discussed with plaintiff’s expert, Dr. David Egilman, means of escaping the order’s restrictions and obtaining protected documents in the expert’s possession…even though Egilman had agreed in writing to be bound by the order…”
“…Both Berenson and Egilman were cognizant of the fact that the (protective order) took account of the possibility that the protected documents could be subpoenaed by courts or executive agencies. So Berenson provided Egilman with the name of an Alaska attorney, James Gottstein, unconnected to the instant litigation, who might be willing to employ a pretense to subpoena the documents and help disseminate them in violation of the protective order…”
“…To carry out the scheme for obtaining and disseminating the protected documents, Gottstein intervened in a state case in Alaska wholly unrelated to Zyprexa. In that case, he then subpoenaed from Egilman confidential documents he knew to be under the protective order which bore no relevance to the Alaska litigation. The subpoenaed documents were sent by Egilman to Gottstein pursuant to an expedited amended subpoena about which Lilly was deliberately kept in the dark so that it would be unable to make a timely objection…Gottstein immediately sent the confidential documents on to Berenson and others…”
“…Intending that they be published extensively, Gottstein distributed the sealed documents to various organizations and individuals. No distribution to newspapers other than The New York Times was made because of Berenson’s explicit warning to his co-conspirators that if the Times was not given “an exclusive” on the story, it would not publish anything at all about the documents…”
Judge Weinstein emphasized that “this is not a case of a newspaper obtaining, with clean hands, documents provided to it by government employees, whistleblowers, or protesters. Acknowledging the Times‘ and Washington Post’s famed publication of the “Pentagon Papers”, he noted there were no allegations that those documents “were purloined” by either newspaper. “Affirmatively inducing the stealing of documents is treated differently from passively accepting stolen documents of public importance for dissemination.”
Much of Judge Weinstein’s opinion is substantiated by testimony given by Mr. Gottstein. Dr. Egilman declined to testify about his role in the “conspiracy,” invoking a Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination (so much for the sound of silence being a funeral dirge!) The Times declined to allow Mr. Berenson to testify about his role citing a “long-held principle” that “it would be inappropriate for any of our journalists voluntarily to testify about news gathering at the Times.”
The New York Times Responds
When I inquired why the story was published without a byline and why it quoted the newspaper’s attorney, aforementioned Times spokeswoman Diane McNulty explained in an email that the article was “assembled by editors” (emphasis mine) because “wire services on the subject did not include a comment from the Times.” As for the decision to insert a quote from Mr. Freeman, Ms. McNulty said: “The settlement did not throw into question any editorial judgment of the Times, which is why the article quoted a lawyer for the Times rather than an editor.”
I cannot help but note the irony of the newspaper of record trying to spin a public relations executive. No byline because the paper relied on wire services? Ok, then why weren’t the wire services credited? At the risk of sounding combative, I thought “attribution” and “fully sourced” were the buzzwords in the Times‘ post-Jayson Blair newsroom. And as for the latter comment, how can the Times‘ editorial judgment not be called into question when it fails to fully cover the fallout from a series of page-one articles it published earlier based on court-sealed, ill-gotten documents leaked with the assistance of a controversial source who now admits they did not “represent the entire set of information?”
In any case, given the significance of Dr. Egilman’s declaration and the prominence given to Mr. Berenson’s damning stories, it’s noteworthy that the Times chose to rely on wire services to cover the settlement story and seemingly made no attempt to contact him or Eli Lilly for comment. The pharmaceutical company had issued a statement on the settlement, but it was not cited in the coverage. Eli Lilly’s news release references Judge Weinstein’s decision and specifically claims the Zyprexa documents were obtained “illegally.” It seems to me that a Fortune 500 company claiming to be a victim of illegal activity is deserving of mention.
Clearly, I was not the only one who had issues with the Times story. A few days after the blurb ran, a correction was issued. I leave it to you to read between the lines:
“An article in Business Day on Saturday about the settlement of a legal dispute in which a doctor was accused of leaking confidential documents to The Times from the drug maker Eli Lilly, left an incorrect impression about the admissions that the doctor, David S. Egilman, made in the settlement. Dr. Egilman acknowledged that Lilly had a different view of the safety of its schizophrenia drug Zyprexa than was portrayed in the documents. He did not admit that he accepted Lilly’s view that Zyprexa was safe.”
Here is a copy of the full declaration by Dr. Egilman [PDF]; take from it what you will.
Afterword
Let’s be clear: I have no idea why Dr. Egilman settled with Eli Lilly, nor can I determine the sincerity of his self-professed public health crusade. All I know of him and his activities are what I’ve read and researched, and the picture that doing so presents. It’s quite possible he simply settled to avoid the time and financial costs of a prolonged legal battle with the Big Company with Much Deeper Pockets. Then again, the same time/cost benefit analysis could just as easily apply as to why Eli Lilly settled with its class action plaintiffs.
For those who automatically assume the worst about drug companies, particularly with respect to drug safety disclosures, an op-ed in last week’s Wall Street Journal by Dr. Scott Gottlieb, a former deputy commissioner of the FDA, offers perspective worth considering. The reality is that drug companies don’t have carte blanche freedom to add risk information to drug labels; that’s the FDA’s call, believe it or not, and they’ve told drug companies in the past to scrub warning language that it deemed superfluous. And now Congress is considering legislation that would make it even easier for trial lawyers to belly up to the “undisclosed risk” trough.
In the case of Zyprexa, Lilly maintains that the labeling provided to physicians identified “the potentially clinically-significant weight gain that was observed in more than half of all patients treated long-term with Zyprexa, as well as the diabetes-related adverse events observed in clinical trials, including diabetes, hyperglycemia and diabetic ketoacidosis.” Perhaps the real issue is that physicians are simply relying far too much on aggressive sales reps to tell them the ups and downs of a drug, rather than actually taking the time to independently read its FDA-approved label. I’m not sure which scenario scares me more…
Eli Lilly quite understandably does not appear to be seeking any legal retribution from the Times, which is probably the best course of action for them. It’s generally accepted as a given in public relations that it is foolhardy for a major company, particularly one in an “easy target” industry that is held in low public esteem, to aggressively attack a powerful newspaper that buys ink by the barrel. Doing so would only heighten awareness of the damaging charges Lilly seeks to rebut and further exacerbate its reputational damage.
There are a great many legal and ethical themes at play in the Eli Lilly/Dr. Egilman/New York Times saga, but at the crux of it all are issues of transparency and accountability – on all fronts. While the media has done an impressive job in recent years guard-dogging the public’s interests by demanding more clarity and less concealment from our corporate leaders, it must also be willing to sound a similar clarion call when other members of the Fourth Estate totter in living up to the exacting standards they so rightfully advocate.
As the saying goes: “If you’re going to talk the talk, you’ve got to walk the walk.”
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September 7, 2007 1:52 pm : Comments 000
Here’s a wrap-up of what other industry-watchers and media folks have been writing about this week:
SABEW’s Talking Biz News points us over to Marketwatch’s commentary on the rumored tensions between CNBC’s Maria Bartiromo and Erin Burnett, and the reasons why the network needs to ensure there’s room for both.
Shel Holtz takes issue with grocer A&P’s response after a customer complained about a risqué parody rap video that two A&P employees (and brothers) filmed in a store’s produce aisle after hours one night and then posted to YouTube. Holtz suggests A&P must be shorthand for “Antiquated & Prehistoric”.
Grumpy Editor says that daily newspapers can partially blame the unappealing, content-light layout of their front pages for their declining readership.
As noted on Seth Godin’s blog, JupiterResearch released a study this week on the effectiveness of viral marketing campaigns. Apparently less than one-fifth of them in the last year actually were effective in prompting consumers to spread the desired commercial word.
“Wikiscanner” fallout continues, catching plenty of organizations and their reputation management-inclined soldiers with their naughty fingers in the cookie jar – I mean on the keyboard – as noted on Portfolio’s tech blog.
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September 6, 2007 9:34 am : Comments 001
As originally posted on Strumpette.com on September 6, 2007.
Like a writer who keeps random plot line ideas and bits of dialogue scribbled in a notebook kept by the side of the bed, I’ve kept the Daily News‘ infamous “Ford to City” headline in the back of my head, just waiting for the right opportunity to rip it off. Thanks to Apple CEO Steve Jobs latest orchestrations, the moment finally arrived.
The technology impresario announced yesterday that Apple would slash the price of its iPhone by some 33%, but denied that lower-than-expected sales were the reason. As he told the New York Times: “It’s very clear we have a breakthrough product on our hands, but it’s also clear that many can afford it, some can’t. We’d like to make it affordable to even more folks going into this holiday season.”
So exactly when did Apple become a philanthropic organization for the tech gadget-deprived?
I don’t know about you, but if I was one of the Apple diehards who camped out overnight a mere 10 weeks ago just for the privilege of coughing up $600 the next morning to get their mitts on an iPhone, I’d be pretty ticked off right now. And I’d go into orbit after reading Jobs’ dismissive comment to USA Today about the brand-worshipping customers who paid full price: “That’s technology. If they bought it this morning, they should go back to where they bought it and talk to them. If they bought it a month ago, well, that’s what happens in technology.”
Can you imagine the fallout if, let’s say, BMW suddenly slashed the cost of its highly popular 3-Series cars by more than 30% just weeks after they were introduced? Or if Rolex slashed the prices of its watches by 30%? The brands would be forever damaged. But the traditional rules of branding and public relations don’t seem to apply to Steve Jobs, and his fire sale discounting of the iPhone is only the latest example.
Take Apple’s exclusive partnership with AT&T. The telecom company has one of the slowest wireless networks around and a solid reputation for bad customer service. Apple offers superior technology, and while its customer support has deteriorated somewhat, it’s still way better than its competitors. The pairing of the two companies is as mismatched as Armani entering an exclusive distribution agreement with Sears.
Then there is the iPhone’s inconvenient replacement battery requirement which, with the exception of the New York Times‘ Joe Nocera, has been largely ignored by the mainstream media. Like all cell phones, this one’s battery will eventually need to be replaced (Apple says the original one will last 200-400 charges, approximately 12-14 months). The kicker is that is must be sent back to Apple, however, leaving people without their beloved iPhone’s for an estimated 10 days. I’m hardly a heavy cell phone user, but being without my phone for just one day would cause me some angst – and mine doesn’t have all the fancy bells and whistles that the iPhone does! A couple of lawsuits have already been filed regarding Apple’s battery replacement policy, but they have received scant media attention.
The cost to replace the battery will be approximately $100, or roughly one quarter the cost of the newly discounted iPhone. My guess is that Jobs will have the next generation model out within a year and he’s banking that a good number of iPhone owners will decide they’ll get better value for their money by replacing the whole phone with the latest version instead of just getting a new battery.
Truthfully, I’m somewhat in awe of Steve Jobs. I give him credit for his unparalleled ability to get away with sticking it to his most ardent customers, for getting the technology media to dance for him like puppets on a string, and for creating an aura that he is not someone driven by profits and personal wealth. P.T. Barnum has long been regarded as the greatest showman on earth, but I suspect even he would agree that Steve Jobs is in a league by himself.
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September 5, 2007 1:17 pm : Comments 000
I have a love/hate relationship with human resources people at big corporations. While their advisory role can be – and should be – as critical to a company’s well-being as, say, that of its attorneys and accountants, my personal experience has not been so… productive. How can I put this? HR people frustrate me. A lot.
I know, I know… when human resources people pushed back, it probably meant they were saving me from myself. And, to be fair, I know that there are lots of exceptional, appreciated human resources professionals out there who are making significant impacts on the cultures and bottom lines of their organizations. Unfortunately for me, I’ve only had the pleasure of crossing paths with one of them in my entire career (and he was a client so I pretty much had to like him).
HR-speak is akin to PR spin. It’s filled with empty catchphrases, trendy buzzwords, and legal counsel-approved language that mollifies executive leadership and mortifies the rank-and-file who see right through it. I’m still aghast at the response an internal Human resources executive once gave me when I complained about the unimpressive job candidates she was sending me: “You know, Eric, your standards are just a little too high.”
Needless to say, I perked up when I read that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer shares my critical view of HR folks. According to a fascinating article in the current issue of BusinessWeek by Michelle Conlin and Jay Greene, Microsoft was suffering a serious brain drain two years ago. But instead of hiring a traditional HR executive to turn things around, Ballmer gave the HR reins to Lisa Brummel, a popular and experienced product manager that he moved over from the Home & Retail Division. Ms. Brummel has achieved considerable success in the two years she’s held the top spot, no doubt because she refused to follow “the usual HR script.”
Some examples:
- Brummel refused to benchmark “best practices” at other companies, much less impose them on Microsoft employees. “Before you go running off campus, you should know what’s going on on campus.”
- She quickly established a reputation as a “no-B.S., jargon-allergic, truth-teller” when she admitted to reading a popular and highly critical Microsoft blog written by an anonymous employee.
- She eliminated the bell curve in annual employee performance evaluations.
The BusinessWeek article is a great read for anyone desperate to have their faith restored in the potential of the human resources function. On the flip side, anonymous Microsoft employee blogger “Mini-Microsoft” suggests that BusinessWeek is a tad too generous in its praise of Brummel and her efforts. [Tough crowd – HR really is a thankless function!]
Still, Conlin and Greene deserve kudos for reporting on the untraditional approach and its impact to date. The bottom line is that Brummel seems to be staunching the company’s employee hemorrhage… at least for now (all bets are off if she takes the towels away again).
Now if only Brummel could do something about Microsoft’s ghastly “Your potential. Our passion.” tagline.
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September 4, 2007 1:56 pm : Comments 001
While the end of summer is always a bit of a downer, this year it was more so because of the passing of two men, both of whom are inspirations to a great many of us.
Richard Jewell died. You may recall that he was the former security guard who was wrongly accused of perpetrating the bombing at the 1996 Olympics. Although he was eventually cleared of any involvement and declared a hero, his legacy as such will forever be tainted by the indelible smear left when he was falsely accused as the bomber in the days that followed. Unnamed sources whispered unsubstantiated rumors to ambitious reporters chasing The Story. As hindsight would bear out, it was not journalism’s finest hour. An innocent man’s good name was decimated in the media feeding frenzy that transpired back then; his story should serve as a stop-and-think moment for everyone involved in the news reporting business. Jewell died last week at age 44, hero to many, including this guest columnist in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
I was also saddened to learn about the death of Arthur Jones, the inventor of Nautilus exercise machines who definitely knew a thing or two about effective public relations. Although I never met the man, he had a major impact on the health of my body and earlier journalism career.
My history with Nautilus equipment goes back nearly 30 years. Although they were initially rather ungainly contraptions, they made weight training considerably more efficient because their patented elliptical cams allowed for a greater range of movement than conventional free weights and dumbbells. The introduction of Nautilus equipment represented a real breakthrough in fitness training. Back then, the prevailing wisdom was that the movement itself was not as important as the number of times that you did it, essentially suggesting that only gym rats could hope to get a good workout. Then along came Jones and his Nautilus machines suggesting you could do more by doing less.
Nautilus equipment – there’s a machine now for virtually every major muscle group – is designed to provide high intensity training via just a dozen or so repetitions of a specific exercise to work a specific area. Jones wasn’t a believer in long-term cardiovascular exercise. He argued that total fitness could be achieved simply by working all your muscle groups to exhaustion.
It’s fortunate for Jones that he understood the power of public relations and how to harness it. After all, he was a lone fish swimming against the tide when he first came out with his initial “Blue Monster” machine. Early on, he finessed some of the leading sports heroes of the day to endorse his equipment, including famed Miami Dolphins running back Mercury Morris and tennis champ Chris Evert. Various actresses and models also endorsed the equipment, including Bo Derek, who at the time was best known for the movie “10.”
In 1980, various health clubs in my native Canada introduced Nautilus equipment. What I found especially intriguing is that they were incredibly popular with women who, at the time, rarely trained with weights. Shortly thereafter I came across a renowned orthopedic surgeon who used Nautilus equipment for rehabilitation purposes. Working as a freelance writer at the time, I wrote a few articles for a major Canadian magazine and newspaper (not available online) about how Nautilus was luring women into the fitness fold. I’m still extremely proud of the prescience of those articles, which helped me land a job at my hometown newspaper, The Toronto Star.
Jones was a colorful character who didn’t mince words, according to many accounts. In his New York Times obit, his son William is said to have characterized him as “a rough-and-tumble character who had six wives, a nearly lifelong smoking habit and an affection for exotic animals like rattlesnakes and crocodiles, which he kept at his farm.” The elder Jones was also known to make more than a few eyebrow-raising comments in his time. (Interestingly, Jones’ other son Gary was one of the inventors of the Hammer Strength line of exercise equipment, unquestionably the best training equipment on the market IMHO).
Jones died last week at the age of 80, living life not so much in the fast lane anymore. And as a result, Jones will no doubt be remembered by most for the good that he did, for the positive contributions he made to touch the lives of people around him and leave them better off for it. It is very sad to me that the same could not be said for Richard Jewell.
Rest in peace, gentlemen.
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